Private polytechnic institutions in Telangana are up in arms against the State government’s decision to remit salaries of truant teachers into the government bank account by April 29, or risk losing their affiliation from this academic year.
Recently, the State Board of Technical Education and Training (SBTET) issued a circular on April 26 (SBTET/B2/AAC/ Bio-metric/2019), instructing the managements of private polytechnic colleges for remittance of staff salary into SBTET account on or before April 29. If not done by the stipulated date, the circular threatened to withdraw their affiliation for the academic year 2019-20.
There are 10 private diploma engineering colleges in the integrated Karimnagar district apart from 170 across in the State. The SBTET’s decision had come as rude shock to the private polytechnic college managements. “How can the government collect the salaries of our teachers? We will give salaries if the teachers attend the college or not. What is the role of the government in instructing the private colleges to remit the salaries of teachers, who abstain from duty, into their bank account,” asked the chairman of a private polytechnic college in the town.
‘Ridiculous threat’
It is “ridiculous” to threaten to stop affiliation of the college if the salaries of teachers are not remitted, he said. “We will not deposit the salaries of our staff in the account. Let the government close down our colleges by denying affiliation. After all the government is paying a fee reimbursement of only ₹14,900 per student and we are spending lakhs to run the diploma engineering courses by providing all facilities to the students and giving quality education, far better than what is provided by government institutes,” he added.
Last year, the government had introduced biometric attendance system (BMAS) in colleges, a move that had been heavily criticised.
